1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to automated computer processing of invoices.
2. Description of the Related Art
For several years companies have been trying to move transactions into an electronic system. Large businesses have the resources and scale to justify the installation of new electronic systems. However, for a large segment of small and medium size enterprises (SMEs), such attempts have not fared well, because it is not cost effective for SMEs to install a dedicated system and there is no standardized transaction system to allow the sharing of costs among many different businesses. For example, each bank offers its own web site payment option, and companies such as Quicken offer either online or check printing or manual check writing as payment methods. However, invoice entry is entirely manual. As a result, it is still the general practice for businesses to send paper invoices to customers, which the customers then process manually.
What is needed are approaches that allow the integration of paper and/or electronic document invoices into an automated system in an enhanced way such that transactions do not require as much manual labor (such as manual input of invoices) as they currently do. What is further desired is that these transactions may eventually be moved into a fully electronic transaction system.